In the construction industry, various products are used, including concrete blocks. Such concrete blocks are precast and are composed inter alia of coarse granular material (the aggregate or filler) embedded in a hard matrix of material (the cement or binder), which fills the spaces between the aggregate particles and glues them together. The binder that is commonly used is Portland cement.
The cement industry is a primary producer of carbon dioxide (CO2), which is recognized as a major greenhouse gas. Thus, disadvantageously, large amounts of CO2 are produced by the chemical reactions occurring in the manufacture of cement.